"know your worth", He says, "you're beautiful because I made you, fearfully and wonderfully. you are My design."

and His truth releases me, if only for a moment, from the deep insecurities and harsh comments and heavy doubts weighing on my soul. and the truth makes me, if only for a moment, the little girl in the white, lacy dress, dancing around my father's feet, beaming and free and secure in my pretty. if only for a moment.

last week, i read this post by my bloggy friend leigh, and it moved something within me. it felt brave and Godly and bold, and it nudged the little girl in the white dress just enough to remind me she was there."Beautiful. You are absolutely beautiful, Leigh Elizabeth," i read, and as the words penetrated my softened heart, i thought, you, too. you too are beautiful, brittany.

but as quickly as the thought rolled in, i forced it out.

it just didn't feel right. it didn't fit. and i immediately realized it didn't line up with everything i thought, everything i'd been taught about good Christian girls.

you see, good Christian girls are supposed to know their worth, their potential, their beauty as daughters of the Creator of our magnificent universe, but we aren't supposed to embrace it. we aren't supposed to delight in it. and we certainly aren't supposed to talk about it.

even thinking about speaking the 3 simple words i am beautiful out loud gives me anxiety. someone compliments my smile and i say, it's easy for my teeth to stand out because my nose is 3 sizes too small for my face. a friend tells my she loves my shirt and i make a comment about my weight and my unhappiness and joke to cover the 30 minutes i spent crying in the mirror that morning.

i am beautiful couldn't be further from my lips. and it feels natural that way. i was raised in a world that tells me i'll never be enough and a church that says beauty is on the inside when i feel it and i should take better care of myself when i don't. i'm supposed to know i'm beautiful but i'm supposed to need you to convince me first. peace is always out of reach because peace in my appearance would be vanity. and the last thing a good Christian girl wants is for you to find her vain.

i can't help but think in all this struggle, in all this insecurity, we got this one wrong. the world and the church, our parents and our friends, our teachers and our mentors. girls and boys and husbands and wives. we all got it wrong.

there is power in seeing, really seeing our beauty. when God declared us fearfully and wonderfully made, when He knit us together in His image, when He called us greater than the skies and the flowers and the vast, open ocean, He told us we are beautiful. worthy of His love, beautiful. worthy of His grace, beautiful. worthy of His son, beautiful. and He never asked us to denounce it or hide from it or call our insecurities humility. humility is holy. insecurities are poisonous.

those moments in the white dress, the twirling and smiling and freedom, they are a gift from God, but they will never last so long as we are uncomfortable with our pretty. the choice is ours. we can dwell on our flaws, meet every compliment with a shortcoming and live a life hiding our desire for beautiful, or we can stand confidently with scripture, grab hands with the One who designed us and believe what He so longs for us to see: we are beautiful. and we are His.

your turn!

how does it feel for you to tell yourself you're beautiful? do you believe it? are you afraid to believe it? what are you afraid of? remember, God created you in HIS image and He, who knows everything about you, has declared you beautiful. embrace it.

verses & references

"I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well." psalm 139:14

"so God created man in His image, in the image of God He created them; male and female He created them." Genesis 1:27

Oh, Brittany, I'm blown away by your words and humbled by the way God used mine to inspire you. You are indeed beautiful, my friend. May we all embrace our beauty in all its forms, knowing that we honor God in doing so.

I red Leigh's post last week and was equally stunned by it. The timing of both your words means so much, as I will be teaching about beauty this weekend to a group of teen girls. I'm praying for God's wisdom and direction, to offer truth that will transform their definition of beauty, and make room for them to see their beauty, too!

Oh, SO GOOD! You know reading and listening to Joseph Prince changed that for me -- realizing that it is more about WHO love me than HOW MUCH I love Him. Because then I have nothing to prove....when I walk into a room, His beautiful, beloved daughter is there. You are right, though, it is a change in our paradigm of thinking!! You go girl, with bravely putting this out there!